Zochreinu

This is a piece of Rosh Hashanah

Almost every word here is also in Zichronot ("Remembrances"), the part of the Rosh Hashanah Musaf about God remembering. Side by side, the two match nearly word for word. The weekday version adds six Hebrew words: "the love of those who came first, Avraham, Yitzchak and Yisrael, Your servants." Then it stops, says "as written in Your Torah," and you read the Akedah itself. Much of the rest of the Rosh Hashanah paragraph comes back right after the Akedah.

Moshe's argument, reused

"Avraham, Yitzchak and Yisrael, Your servants" comes from Moshe. After the golden calf, when God was ready to destroy the people, Moshe said: "Remember Avraham, Yitzchak and Yisrael, Your servants, to whom You swore by Yourself." The next verse says God relented. Rashi (the classic commentator, France, died 1105) explains the argument: You did not swear by heaven or earth, which will end, but by Yourself, and You last forever. His proof is the oath at the Akedah: "By Myself I swear."

Three words, three promises

The covenant, the kindness, the oath. The phrase echoes Devarim 7:12: "the covenant and the kindness that He swore to your ancestors." Abudarham (a commentary on the prayers, written in Spain around 1340) says each word points to something specific. The covenant is the one in Bereishit 15, giving the land to Avraham's descendants. The kindness is that the land came to Avraham as a gift of God's kindness. The oath is what God swore on Mount Moriah right after the Akedah: "By Myself I swear."

Two verbs, one request

The prayer asks twice: zochreinu (remember us) and pokdeinu (attend to us), from the verb pakad. Abudarham says the pair comes from Tehillim 106:4, "Remember me, Hashem ... attend to me with Your rescue," and that here the two mean the same thing. The Gemara records a debate about exactly this: on Rosh Hashanah, do pakad verses count as remembering verses? Rabbi Yose says yes. Rabbi Yehuda says no. One of Rabbi Yose's examples is "Hashem pakad Sarah," the verse that leads into the birth of Yitzchak.

How it got into the weekday siddur

The Tur (a code of Jewish law from the 1300s) says it is good to say the Akedah passage each morning. In that line it mentions only the Torah passage. About 200 years later, Rabbi Yosef Karo (author of the Shulchan Aruch, the main code of Jewish law) describes "our siddurim": this paragraph, then the Akedah, then a closing prayer. He is commenting on the Tur's report that Ashkenazi siddurim had a different prayer there. Today the paragraph is printed in Ashkenazi siddurim too.

Why bring up the Akedah every day?

Rabbi Yosef Karo gives two reasons for saying the Akedah each morning. One: to bring the merit of the ancestors before God. Two: to bend your own impulses toward serving God, the way Yitzchak gave himself. This paragraph is the first reason, said out loud. The Mishnah Berurah (a central commentary on daily Jewish law, written around 1900) adds that saying the words is not enough. You are supposed to think about what you are saying.

Remembered for what?

Being remembered by God sounds like good news. The Zohar (the central book of Kabbalah) says there are two kinds. "God remembered Noach" is the good kind. But the verb behind "attend to us" is also the verb in "I will punish their offense with the rod." So the Zohar warns: unless you are completely righteous, do not pray "remember me and attend to me." Those words can be taken from your mouth and used to bring up what you did wrong. Its advice: pray as one of the many. Now look at this prayer: "remember us," "a good remembrance."

בַּר נָשׁ כַּד צַלֵּי צְלוֹתֵיהּ, לָא יֵימָא עֲלֵיהּ זָכְרֵנִי וּפָקְדֵנִי. בְּגִין דְּאִיכָּא זְכִירָה וּפְקִידָה לְטַב, וּזְכִירָה וּפְקִידָה לְבִישׁ

God does not forget. So what are we asking?

This prayer's opening words are also said in the Rosh Hashanah Musaf, in the blessing Zichronot ("Remembrances"). That blessing says God forgets nothing. So what does it mean to ask Him to remember? The Shem MiShmuel (Rabbi Shmuel Bornsztain of Sochatchov, a Chassidic master in Poland who died in 1926) answers from how your own memory works. Something you almost forgot leaves a faint trace. Remembering brings it from hidden to open. God's choice of the Jewish people is real but hidden, he says. Asking God to remember is asking for it to show.

וזה היא לשון זכירה שדבר שהוא בהעלם יבוא בהתגלות

Chosen with no reason given

The Maharal of Prague (a major Jewish thinker who died in 1609) takes up an old question. Before God speaks to Noach, the Torah says Noach was righteous. Before God says "Go" to Avraham, it says nothing about him. Why? Had a reason been given, he answers, the love would hang on it, and, as the Mishnah (the core text of the Oral Torah) says, a love that depends on something ends when that thing ends. Avraham was chosen together with his descendants, and not as a reward. So the choice cannot be canceled. Now read the words "the covenant" again.

ולכך לא הזכיר זכותו, לומר כי הבחירה הזאת לא תליא בזכות כלל, ולכך אי אפשר שיהיה דבר זה בטל

A love you inherited

This prayer names "the love of those who came first." The Tanya (the founding book of Chabad Chassidut, by Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, who died in 1812) is not about this prayer, but it describes a love that is passed down. Every Jew carries a love of God in the heart that he calls "hidden love," and it is "an inheritance to us from our fathers." You did not build it. In the wicked, he says, it is asleep. It wakes up when they are tested on faith itself, and then acts with no reasons or arguments, as if denying God were simply not possible.

״אַהֲבָה מְסוּתֶּרֶת״ שֶׁבְּלֵב כְּלָלוּת יִשְׂרָאֵל, שֶׁהִיא יְרוּשָּׁה לָנוּ מֵאֲבוֹתֵינוּ

Something you can count on, freely given

The prayer names "the covenant" and "the kindness" side by side. Rav Kook (the first Chief Rabbi of the Land of Israel, who died in 1935) says anything great in the life of the spirit needs two things. It has to be secure, something that holds firm. And it has to be free, coming from a will that is all generosity. A covenant is the first: secure and firm. Kindness is the second: a gift. Here, he writes, we name both together. Think about the relationships you count on most, and check for both.

את הבטחון והאמץ של הברית, ואת החפש והנדיבות של החסד

Do I have to say this?

The Shulchan Aruch (the main code of Jewish law) says it is "good to say" the Akedah passage, the Torah reading that comes next. It does not call it a duty. Peninei Halakhah (a modern guide to Jewish law by Rabbi Eliezer Melamed) rules that the passages and prayers printed in this part of the siddur are good to say but not required. Only the daily offering passage became an obligation. Still, the Aruch HaShulchan (a law code from around 1900) writes: "The Akedah passage we certainly say." Zochreinu is its lead-in.

Is it enough to read the words?

Not for the Akedah passage, says the Mishnah Berurah (a central commentary on daily Jewish law): "Saying it is not enough. He should think about what he is saying and recognize the wonders of God." He gives two reasons to say it: the merit of our ancestors, and bending your own impulses, the way Yitzchak gave himself up. His source is Rabbeinu Bachya (a Torah commentator in Spain around 1300). On the offering passages, he says the Sages cannot have meant mouthing bare verses without thinking about what they mean.

I am running late. What goes first?

Peninei Halakhah rules that even someone in a hurry should try to say at least the passage of the daily offering and the incense verses, which come a few pages on. This paragraph is not on that short list. The Biur Halacha (the Mishnah Berurah's longer notes) says the offering passages should not make you miss the time for Shema, or even praying with the congregation. And the Mishnah Berurah: if you are short on time and say less, but mean it, God counts it like the long version of someone who had the time.

Do I say it on Shabbat?

The Akedah passage, yes: the Mishnah Berurah rules it may be said even on Shabbat. For Zochreinu, the siddurim differ. A Nusach Sefard prayer book for Rosh Hashanah prints above it: "On Shabbat and Yom Tov this prayer is not said." One for Yom Kippur says "some have the custom" not to. The Chabad siddur leaves it out on any day without Tachanun (the pleading prayers after the Amidah). The weekday Siddur Sefard has that note only on the paragraph after the Akedah.

Should my tefillin be on by now?

If you wear tefillin, that was the practice of the Arizal (Rabbi Yitzchak Luria, the kabbalist of Tzfat in the 1500s). Kaf HaChaim (a Sephardic law commentary from the early 1900s) reports that he said all the morning blessings, then put on tallit and tefillin, and began his prayer from the Akedah passage. The Ben Ish Chai (a book of law by Rabbi Yosef Chaim of Baghdad, late 1800s) rules: put tefillin on right after the tallit, before the Akedah passage, so they are on for the Shema later in this section.

Is the Akedah only for the morning?

The Mishnah Berurah places the Akedah before the morning offering passages. The Ben Ish Chai, in his book Od Yosef Chai, reports that one earlier author argued people should say it at Mincha (the afternoon prayer) too. Others disagreed, and the Ben Ish Chai finds their reasoning more convincing. Their reason comes from Kabbalah: saying the Akedah is meant to "bind" strict judgment. That fits the morning, a time when kindness rules. The afternoon is a time of judgment, and not the moment to take it on.